Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!portal!cup.portal.com!Will
From: Will@cup.portal.com (Will E Estes)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.nfs
Subject: Help Understanding How NFS Is Used
Message-ID: <30785@cup.portal.com>
Date: 14 Jun 90 22:33:57 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Lines: 19

Never having used NFS, I need some help understanding the basics of how it
works.  As I understand it, you use PC-NFS to map a remote file system onto
the tree structure of one of your PC hard drives (or maybe to map the
remote file system to a new drive letter).   Now here are my questions: 

When you do a read/write operation on a remote NFS-controlled file, is the 
file then marked as read-only for any other concurrent user of the file?

Does NFS always ship you the entire file, or is it smart enough to ship
only the portions that are currently being read?

When you modify the file inside of an editor and then save it to disk 
does NFS always send the entire file back to the NFS server?

Where can I read more on NFS' architecture?

Thanks,
Will Estes        (sun!portal!cup.portal.com!Will)